Part XXXV
Captain's Log : Supplemental - Chief Medical Officer Leonard McCoy has been found and is currently receiving medical attention. The augment leader, Khan, and Remus, his second in command have been taken into custody.
Lady M'hirra has made use of her position of Ambassador to Turdidae to gain permission for the Enterprise crew to assist in containing the remaining augments in Bahr and will be contacted the other regions to see if she can gain their permission as well.
It didn't surprise the Captain that the medical team beaming down had consisted of Chapel and one of the other senior nurses. Nothing short of a direct order or a death threat (or perhaps a combination of the two) seemed to be able to get M'benga to set foot off of the ship unless shore leave was involved.
Kirk was doing his best not to hover, but when Chapel shot him an exasperated look, he knew he wasn't succeeding very well. Looking around for something to distract him, he noticed Spock and Alistair speaking with the other man that had been unconscious when they'd arrived. The slave collar that matched the ones on McCoy and Alistair marked him as one of the surviving Azalaris crewmembers. The obvious sign of Klingon blood in his ancestry seemed to point as to which member it was.
Spock lifted his head as the Captain came over which caused the man still resting on the floor to look up at the approaching officer. Kirk didn't even have the opportunity to start to speak first.
"So - you're Len's commanding officer? Alright, I think I can see that."
At that puzzling statement, Kirk gave Spock a look. Spock's eyebrow gave the Vulcan equivalent of a shrug in response, so Kirk went straight to the source.
"You're K'toomsu?"
The man's craggy features shifted to a smile.
"Not a half bad attempt at pronouncing that for a Terran. Most of the rest just give up the fight and call me Kuty."
A half-smile formed on Kirk's face. He already liked this man and he wasn't quite sure why.
"Alright - Kuty. What is it that you think you can see?"
"Why Len stayed loyal to you even when he was pretty well convinced he'd never see you again. Life would have likely been considerable smoother for him if he'd at least pretended to switch loyalties over to Khan."
Kirk gave a side glance over to his long-time friend - what he could see of him around Chapel.
"Is that a polite way of saying Doctor McCoy is too stubborn for his own good sometimes?"
K'toomsu rubbed the back of his neck around the slave collar.
"Len couldn't have faked willingness to follow Khan any better than I could pass for dancing girl on Risa. But Khan doesn't appreciate anyone who is loyal to anyone but himself."
"How did Khan and his group take over your ship?"
"All too easily. We came across their ship. If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn't have bothered to wake Harry up. I'd have armed the weapons, breeched the Botany Bay's hull and save us all a great deal of grief."
Spock's eyebrow crept up.
"That sounds quite . . . callous."
"It is. Don't expect me to exhibit any sympathy regarding Khan. I wasn't overly thrilled with the other augments taking over the Azalaris, but it wasn't until Khan recovered that the enslavement and killings started. Have either of you been under a slave's collar before?"
The memory of Triskelion and the collar he wore as the property of Provider One was still very fresh in Kirk's mind.
"I have."
"This is my second time. The experience does not improve."
Alistair, who was staying roughly between Kuty and McCoy, piped up.
"Kuty's the one that's kept the rest of us going. And kept Doc from essentially committing suicide by attacking Khan."
Kirk's puzzled look showed how hard it was to picture McCoy doing that, so K'toomsu explained.
"We were all there when Khan ordered the rest of the crew to be airlocked. Including Len."
Spock nodded, recalling the doctor's reaction when Kirk had been forced to prevent him from saving Edith Keeler.
"Understandable. Preventable loss of life has never set well with the good doctor. Might I ask what was the cause?"
It was Alistair that spoke up again, bitterness thick in his voice.
"The cause? Khan decided he wanted more elbow room. He ordered it immediately after collaring the rest of us."
Kirk was stunned at that. He'd thought that the Azalaris crew had fought Khan's takeover and those that had been ejected were used as an example to the remainder. The thought of it having been done in cold blood hadn't even crossed his mind. The soft Russian curse to the side seemed to indicate that even Chekov hadn't considered that.
"But we found blood on McCoy's shirt - we assumed there had been a struggle."
Eyes darkening, K'toomsu nodded.
"There was one, but not until after Khan made his decision. Our people didn't go into the airlock willingly and a couple had weapons the Augs didn't know about. There were no fights before that. Harry had taken them on as passengers."
When K'toomsu paused, Alistair added.
"The blood got on Doc's shirt when Khan took one of the blades used in the fight and cut it off of him. Like he was trying to strip Doc of part of his identity."
Spock regarded the young Engineer.
"What of Mister Mudd in all of this? He was your captain, was he not?"
"What of him? Harry would have sold out his own mother to keep his own hide intact. You really think he cared? He never raised his voice once to protest anything done to us."
"He still lives then?"
"He does, but I think the Augs have a lower opinion of him than even we do. Khan has him doing the stuff he doesn't trust us to do and thinks is too menial for his Augs to do. He's the one -"
Alistair stopped suddenly, head turning to look over to McCoy when Chapel's audible and uncharacteristic curse came out. Kirk moved back over to her.
"What is it? Can't you figure out how to remove the control device?"
"Not without knowing what I'm dealing with, Captain. From what I've read on studies of these kinds of devices, some of them are designed to cause massive amounts of damage if removal is attempted. I can't even get a proper reading to tell where exactly it is."
M'hirra spoke up again.
"Does anyone know if the devices were bought in Bahr?"
K'toomsu turned, regarding the Caitian woman.
"We were in Tohr when Harry bought the damned things."
There was a quick conference between M'hirra and one of the Turdidaen women before M'hirra spoke again.
"That is fortunate. I am told that in Tohr, the devices will cause pain to discourage removal, but nothing that should cause permanent damages. In Bahr, some of them can be fatal if tampered with."
A moment of silence followed, then K'toomsu moved over to Chapel.
"Len is already injured. Remove the one from me first so that you can see what it does and know what to expect when you remove his."
She looked over to the Captain and Kirk hesitated before giving her a nod of approval. Turning back to K'toomsu, Chapel gave him a slight smile of appreciation.
"Do you know where the implant is?"
"It is impossible not to know. It stays cold."
He held out his arm and pointed directly to the spot with his other hand. Chapel scanned it with her tricorder, then frowned.
"Some part of the device is definitely blocking the sensor readings. I'm still not picking anything up beyond the temperature difference you mentioned. I don't like trying to extract something like this blind."
"All the more reason to take out mine first. Do it. Please."
A weak voice came from behind.
"First time I've heard you beg, Kuty."
Making a sound that was half snort and half chuckle, K'toomsu moved past Chapel and knelt by McCoy. The doctor's eyes were still closed and one hand was on his forehead.
"About time you woke back up, slacker."
"Not my fault, Kuty. Must have took a pretty hard blow though. You wouldn't believe the things I've been hallucinating."
Kirk knelt down silently at the other side of McCoy before laying a hand on his arm.
"How bad is it, Bones?"
The rapid turn of his head as his eyes opened proved to be too much for McCoy. Kirk and K'toomsu quickly found themselves supporting him as he threw up what little was on his stomach.
"Easy, Len. No hallucinations this time. Your crew's found you."
Then K'toomsu gave a bemused look to Kirk.
"Bones? Len could use some weight on him, but that still seems an odd nickname."
"Long story."
Chekov came up behind Kirk and he glanced over his shoulder to see what the Ensign wanted.
"Yes, Mister Chekov?"
"Excuse me, Captain, but Lady M'hirra said you would probably need these, sir."
Looking over to see what was been spoken of, K'toomsu broke in.
"Those are the control devices for the implants. Be careful where you grab them."
On hearing what the items were, Spock stepped forward.
"I will take those, Mister Chekov. Perhaps, between myself and Mister Alistair, we can determine how to deactivate the implants."
A toolkit was beamed down to them, then Spock and Alistair quietly commandeered one of the tables in the room as a worktable. Kirk and Chekov were discussing with K'toomsu the best way to takeover the Azalaris when Spock came over several minutes later.
"Status report, Spock?"
"We believe we have found the procedure needed to fully deactivate the implants, but there is a trigger built into the control that makes it impossible to deactivate it without the implant being activated first."
K'toomsu gave a snort at that.
"Fail-safe. To make sure the slave doesn't simply take the control and turn it off."
Spock nodded in agreement.
"That would indeed seem to be the intent behind the trigger. The discomfort to you and the doctor -"
Whatever else might have been wrong with McCoy, his hearing was still excellent.
"Will be worth it if it gets rid of this hardware. Kuty can speak for himself, but for me? Go on and get it over with. I can't go around with something in me that might get triggered unexpectedly - like when I'm performing surgery."
Acknowledging the validity of that, Spock looked to Kirk, who nodded as he gripped one of McCoy's hands. After a pause, Spock nodded as well.
"Very well, Doctor. As this was meant as a preventive measure, I doubt the sensation will be pleasant"
"Already know how the damn thing feels. Get it over with."
Returning to the table, Spock and Alistair exchanged a few quick ideas. They might not be able to prevent the pain, but they would do everything they could do lessen the duration as much as possible.
There was no warning given for when they started, but Kirk had a pretty good idea that they began about two-tenths of a second before McCoy started to crush his hand. He didn't try to pull his hand free though, he just held on tighter himself. From the look on his friend's face, the discomfort Kirk was going through was nothing compared to what the doctor was being subjected to.
Fortunately for both of them, it didn't last nearly as long as it felt like. Kirk didn't move away as Chapel began running a new scan. He could hear the Turdidaen infants crying in the background, but it sounded like they were already starting to calm so he kept his focus on his friend.
"Bones?"
A deep breath followed by a soft sigh answered him before the blue eyes opened and focused on him again.
"It worked, Jim. The cold the thing always radiated - that's gone now."
A smile formed on Chapel face a minute later.
"Whatever they did also turned off whatever was blocking my scanner."
"Good - get the damn thing outta me, Chris."
She hesitated, looking at the readings again.
"Are you sure? It might be better to wait until we're back onboard."
"No. I personally have no desire to see if teleportation might trigger something that causes it to turn back on again. I'll do the procedure on myself if I have to."
That was all the encouragement needed for Chapel to proceed with the extraction, which went smoothly. The deactivation and removal of K'toomsu's implant followed soon after. K'toomsu was still catching his breath from that when M'hirra came back over to Kirk.
"The leadership has requested that the remainder of the Augments be taken for trial as soon as possible and have authorized me to tell you that you have been granted leeway to act as you see fit to bring this about."
"Thank you, Lady M'hirra. Your assistance in this has been invaluable."
Kirk turned from her to meet K'toomsu's eyes.
"Well, ready to get the rest of your crew freed, Kuty?"
"More than ready, Captain Kirk."